The Scarlet Pimpernel

[BCfitasafiddle]

Posted: 5/4/21 at 7:10pm

Been listening to the score all day.. what great songs. I forget how many good ones there are.

Could a revival ever happen? It's not that well known.

Laura Osnes was impeccable in the concert a few years ago. 

[bwayphreak234]

Posted: 5/4/21 at 7:27pm

I LOVE this show so much. Such a great score. I would love for a revival to happen, but I don't know if it ever will. As a Wildhorn show, it is almost guaranteed a kiss of death by the critics. I saw the concert version a few years ago, though, and I agree that Laura Osnes was a dream as Marguerite!

[EDSOSLO858]

Posted: 5/4/21 at 7:48pm

My parents absolutely love this show, especially the title song and “Into the Fire.”

I met Doug Sills at “War Paint” four years ago, voiced my praises for him in both WP and “Pimpernel”, and started singing to him: “David walked into the valley...”. I was shocked to see him react so rudely.

It’s a shame my parents and I missed the 2019 Lincoln Center concert version led by Tony Yazbeck.

[Kitsune]

Posted: 5/4/21 at 8:37pm

I went with a friend to see Christine Andreas' cabaret show a few years ago. We (both in our 30s) told her afterwards about listening to Scarlet Pimpernel in high school, and she laughed and teased us about how that made her feel old. She was very sweet.

I made a cross-country weekend trip to see the Lincoln Center concert in 2019. At the time it felt crazy, but given the theater shutdown of 2020 and 2021, I'm grateful that I went for it. Really loved both Laura Osnes and Tony Yazbeck. 

The Takarazuka Revue (all-female theater company in Japan) has done Scarlet Pimpernel three times since 2008, plus several co-ed productions. Fun fact: Aran Kei (a male-role Takarazuka actress who played Percy in 2008) went on to play Marguerite in a co-ed production several years later.

[RunnyBabbit]

Posted: 5/4/21 at 10:20pm

We had a subscription for the touring Broadway shows in Philly when I was younger. Normally I went with my mom, but she had plans one day (probably as basketball game, knowing her) and so my dad had to go with me. Neither of us were excited about seeing The Scarlet Pimpernel and were actively trying to pawn off the tickets on family/friends.

We LOVED it and had a great time. I still listen to the cast recording on the regular and would love to see a revival.

[Wick3]

Posted: 5/4/21 at 10:49pm

I, too, am glad I got to see the 2019 concert starring Laura Osnes, Tony Yazbeck, and Norm Lewis!

Does anyone know if there is a video out there? I found highlights from the concert in the BWW link below and some rehearsal vids on youtube:

https://www.broadwayworld.com/videoplay/BWW-TV-Watch-Highlights-of-Tony-Yazbeck-Laura-Osnes-Norm-Lewis-More-in-THE-SCARLET-PIMPERNEL-20190219

 

[BCfitasafiddle]

Posted: 5/4/21 at 11:24pm

Wick3 said: "I, too, am glad I got to see the 2019 concert starring Laura Osnes, Tony Yazbeck, and Norm Lewis!

Does anyone know if there is a video out there? I found highlights from the concert in the BWW link below and some rehearsal vids on youtube:

https://www.broadwayworld.com/videoplay/BWW-TV-Watch-Highlights-of-Tony-Yazbeck-Laura-Osnes-Norm-Lewis-More-in-THE-SCARLET-PIMPERNEL-20190219

Thank you for posting the video! I hadn’t seen anything from the production since seeing it live. Gosh, Osnes delivered that song exquisitely. It was even better onstage that night. And Yazbeck, wow. He grows on me the more and more I see of him. 
i wish there was a recording of this cast! Such stunning music.

Updated On: 5/5/21 at 11:24 PM

[LizzieCurry]

Posted: 5/5/21 at 10:06am

This is one of those shows that I never loved but have always liked quite a bit, and the concert was fantastic! The sound was muddy where I was (front mezz, I think), but it was such a joy to see it again and hear that amazing overture. Like the Joseph concert, I was hoping it was a precursor to a revival, but... we'll see...?

[Someone in a Tree2]

Posted: 5/5/21 at 10:57am

I wish I could share the other posters’ love of this show. I’ll grant you much of the score is swell. But my husband and I saw the OBC and have never felt so unwelcome in a theater. The constant homophobia and f*g-baiting in the script that had the audience guffawing uproariously made us want to crawl under our pricey seats. Someone would have to rip whole chunks out of the script to make this show palatable to today’s audiences (well, I pray that’s true anyway).

Updated On: 5/5/21 at 10:57 AM

[Wick3]

Posted: 5/5/21 at 11:16am

Hasn’t this musical undergone several revisions since the OBC in 1997?

[LizzieCurry]

Posted: 5/5/21 at 11:20am

Yes; even the Lincoln Center concert included a new(ish?) song that had been written for a Japanese production.

[g.d.e.l.g.i.]

Posted: 5/5/21 at 11:25am

Playbill has the short "oral history" version, and the official site covers what got changed over time in its history section. (Apparently what is licensed is closest to the version that ultimately played the Neil Simon.)

Updated On: 5/5/21 at 11:25 AM

[henrikegerman]

Posted: 5/5/21 at 12:22pm

A wonderful score (if one can overlook the abysmal opening number). 
It is material that could so easily have been made into a great musical, especially with so many beautiful songs, but it wasn't... it's been decades since I've seen the show but what struck me then was the irony that the classic Leslie Howard-Merle Oberon-Raymond Massey movie had more a feel of musical comedy than the musical does.  A delicious buoyancy to the romance, inimical to the story, was absurdly missing,  The show seemed hellbent on being "weighty" when it would have been far more moving with a lighter touch.

Updated On: 5/5/21 at 12:22 PM

[CATSNYrevival]

Posted: 5/5/21 at 3:01pm

I love this show. I do wish they'd settle on a final version but that seems to be asking a lot of Frank.

[SporkGoddess]

Posted: 5/5/21 at 4:13pm

I love the show and would have liked to have seen the concert production (Laura Osnes is amazing as always and Norm Lewis's "Falcon in the Dive" is the best I've ever heard vocally). That being said, as a fan of the book series, I don't like how the musical treats Percy's foppishness as a ruse. In the books, he does play into being a fop to fool people, but it's also very much a part of who he is.

[g.d.e.l.g.i.]

Posted: 5/5/21 at 5:49pm

CATSNYrevival said: "I love this show. I do wish they'd settle on a final version but that seems to be asking a lot of Frank."

I mean, they have. What's licensed and available is it, in the absence of any new developments in licensing. Changes for professional productions that never make it to amateur presenters more or less don't count until they're made available, although they're certainly not immune to copying them anyway.

[blaxx]

Posted: 5/5/21 at 8:47pm

Someone in a Tree2 said: "I wish I could share the other posters’ love of this show. I’ll grant you much of the score is swell. But my husband and I saw the OBC and have never felt so unwelcome in a theater. The constant homophobia and f*g-baiting in the script that had the audience guffawing uproariously made us want to crawl under our pricey seats. Someone would have to rip wholechunks out of the script to make this show palatable to today’s audiences (well, I pray that’s true anyway)."

I had a friend in the production and sat through all 37 versions of this. It just kept getting worse and worse, the anecdote in itself is not that exciting as to sustain a 2 act.